February 29 - Leap Day - Leap Year Cancels

Very neat thread. A lot of nice stuff.

I've often thought of doing some date-centric collection, but have never gotten around to it.

One other fun collection would be to collect January 1st (or early Jan) dates where the year slug wasn't changed, and is obviously the prior year.

Here's my only one:

Thank you, Interesting area for collecting, never thought of it myself.


Ray

A second round of year-by-year covers for 2020:

1812 – Folded letter datelined at Amenia, New York on Feb 27, 1812, and postmarked at Poughkeepsie, New York on leap day. Rated at 12-1/2 cents for 90 to 150 miles. Sent collect.


1824 – Folded letter datelined at Deerfield, New York on Feb 27, 1824, and posted at Utica, New York on leap day. Rated at 12 cents for 80 to 150 miles, but no doubt interpreted as 12-1/2 cents. Sent collect.


1832 – Putnam, Ohio manuscript postmark and rating. Originally rated at 6 cents for not over 30 miles, it was subsequently marked "undercharged" and re-rated to 10 cents for 30 to 80 miles. The difference being "as the crow flies" and distance actually carried on post roads. Sent collect.


1836 – New York, New York handstamp in red and 12-1/2 cent rate marking for 80 to 150 miles to Philadelphia. Sent collect.


1840 – New York, New York handstamp and arced "PAID" markings, both in red. Rated at 10 cents for 30 to 80 miles. Sent pre-paid!


1844 – Harrisburg, Pennsylvania handstamp and "PAID" markings in blue. Rated at 12-1/2 cents for 80 to 150 miles. The signature at the upper left translates into Elisha Sheldon Goodrich / Transcribing Clerk Senate. State officials had no free franking authority, but his signature and title no doubt authorized the postage prepayment at the post office.



1848 – New York, New York with a Boyd's City Express local stamp (20L4) on folded letter tied by NYC handstamp with "5 cts" within the bottom of the dial. Sent collect to New Haven, CT.


1852 – New York, New York "paid 3" handstamp. The 3-cent prepaid letter rate began in 1851, and this device is known used into 1853, thus 1852 use.


1856 – Harrisburg, Pennsylvania postmark and matching blue "PAID 3" in an oval.


1860 – Boston, Massachusetts red city date stamp and black "PAID". Stamp with double frame line at left.



1864 – Taunton, Massachusetts postmark with internal year date and a nice star-in-circle killer.


1868 – North Manchester, Connecticut double-ring circle device with separate concentric circle "target" killer.


1872 – Lancaster, Ohio handstamp with quartered cork killer on stamp printed by the National Bank Note Company showing type B relief which first appeared in January 1872.


1876 – Lewisville, Indiana manuscript cancel on UX3 postal card to Bentonville, IN. (Fricke, SP-26)


1884 – West Dedham, Norfolk County, Massachusetts toothed double circle handstamp with duplexed star killer.


1888 – McGrawville, New York with "M.C. Bingham, P.M." at the bottom of the CDS, and with duplexed star-in-circle killer on UX5 postal card used locally.


1892 – Two for one! Hurleton, California and Forbestown, California. Handstamped county cancels on registered package receipt card. Forbestown was one of only 5 or 6 towns to use the famous "kicking mule" duplexed killer.


1896 – Chicago, Illinois American flag machine cancel on cover with advertising text for DeWitt's patent medicines.


1900 - not a leap year.

1904 – Shenandoah, Iowa with a Doremus machine cancel.


1908 – San Francisco, California with a steel duplex cancel on leather postcard used locally.


1912 – Uncashed Post Office Department check for 1 cent made out to George H. Burfeind, probably the coin and curio dealer in Washington, DC.


1916 – Baltimore, Maryland, Towson & Catonsville R.P.O., American flag machine cancel. A streetcar cancel.


1920 (Sunday!) – Centerville, Iowa American flag machine cancel. 1920 leap day cancels are particularly difficult to find.

1924 – New York, New York with an early meter imprint out of the Madison Square Sta.


1928 – Kansas City, Missouri with an unusual modified permit or meter machine installed at the Federal Reserve Sta. These were used in very few locations. The stamp is from the White Plains souvenir sheet, provable by the top margin. Philatelic, but eye-catching.


1932 – Los Angeles, California roller cancel, a very unusual style.


1936 – Binghamton, New York with a two cent meter imprint for a local rate letter, forwarded to Ft Lauderdale, FL which then required the 3 cent inter-city rate and the 1 cent due stamp added at Ft L.


1940 – Harrisonville, New Jersey registered cover to Swedesboro, New Jersey which arrived there on the same day.



1944 – Bridgeport, Connecticut airmail cover chasing a soldier to 30th General Hospital at APO 514 (Mansfield, England), then to several other hospitals afterward!



1948 (Sunday!) – Seattle, Washington Universal machine cancel on UC14 or UC15 airmail envelope.


1952 – St. Albans (Vermont) & Boston (Massachusetts), R.P.O., steel duplex with R.M.S. within the killer bars.


1956 – Balboa, Canal Zone, "Paquebot" cancel on U.S. Scott C39 booklet stamp.


1960 – Chicago, Illinois cancel on International Reply Coupon, IRC16, 13 cents revalued to 15 cents.


1964 – Hillsboro, Ohio, Sugar Tree Ridge Rural Station 4-bar handstamp.


1968 – Hamilton, Ohio International Flier machine cancel touting the use of Zip Codes, but using a dial without it.


1972 – Union City, California International machine cancel on change of address card.


1976 (Sunday!) – Rockford, Illinois facer-canceler style machine cancel on returned warranty card for buying a wig.


1980 – Milwaukee, Wisconsin with a Milcopex'80 show cachet emphasizing historic preservation.


1984 – Sitka, Alaska with Universal Model-D machine on a souvenir cover from the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Woodruff.


1988 – Oshkosh, Wisconsin Facer canceler with 140th anniversary slogan for Berlin, WI touting the fur and leather industry there.


1992 – Muncie, Indiana paired machine and spray cancel, cropped from a full cover.


1996 – Larsen, Wisconsin (International HD-2); Castle Rock, Washington (Universal Model D); and Sturgeon Lake, Minnesota (Universal Model K) small offices had small machines, the first and last examples here being hand-cranked. Most all of these machines have been retired in favor of central processing at regional facilities.


2000 – Pensacola, Florida machine cancel, cropped from a full envelope. This almost has the look of a Chamberlain ASC (Advanced Small Canceller), introduced in small post offices about 1990 – or some similar machine. Specifically I would note the use of a 5-digit zip code, the lack of any punctuation marks, the irregular digit shape and positioning in "2000", and the wide gap between the dial and the wavy killer bars. I know the USPS was also trying to increase interchangeability of parts between machines in this era. I don't think it is a regular 4-head facer-canceler. It just doesn't "feel" right. Insights welcome.


2004 (Sunday!) – Rob Haeseler took this piece of junk mail he received on 2/24/2004 back to his Sidney, Ohio post office on February 29 to have it canceled as a souvenir. Rob wrote-up this item in his April 19, 2004 Linn's column.


2008 – Clarksburg, West Virginia, adhesive paper tape applied over the counter.


2012 – Two meter imprints on business mail, showing presort discount. Not as exciting to most of us as stamped mail, but how many of these will get saved?


2016 – Indianapolis, Indiana spray cancel provides dating, and like modern metered mail, does not traditionally cancel the forever stamp leaving its coded area readable.


The most recent items certainly show how mail processing and postal history are constantly changing. What will 2020 bring?

Indeed, a tour de force through US postal history based on just one date, John Becker.

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Corner the market much, JayBee ?

I seem to recall that there was a Feb 30 postmark and the Leap Year/International Date Line (American Samoa?) used in a pinch back close to WWII?
Don

The fact that many of your covers are also interesting usages makes this even better.

Very impressive collection.

Let's all help John out. If he will provide a good mailing address let's send him a card or letter postmarked tomorrow. I think I have a good address and plan on sending out a note franked with the current US frog stamp(s) from my small town.

Happy Leap Day, 2020! I've really enjoyed this thread.

Some revenue canx to enjoy:

29 Feb 1864



29 Feb 1868



29 Feb 1872

Some additional leap year postal history notes

In Alan H. Patera's article titled 'POST OFFICE CENTENNIALS' he says



And in Richard Helbock's article "NINETEENTH CENTURY POST OFFICES OF WALLOWA COUNTY, OREGON" he states,



Don

Some additional revenue uses:

1868 – Revenue stamped paper RN-B1 used from Jersey City, New Jersey.


1872 – Revenue stamped paper RN-C1 used from Paris, Illinois.


1940 – Beer stamp REA183 used by the Dobler Brewing Company of Albany, New York. Second image is the back side (reversed to read correctly).

Great thread guys.

Robert